Episode Transcript
[00:00:12] Speaker A: Welcome to Kendall speaks. I'm Dr. Brian Stewart Kendall, campus President. Today we're honored to have two distinguished guests with us. First, our Dean of Continuing Education and professional development, Mr. Enrique Infonson. Welcome.
[00:00:24] Speaker B: Morning, Brian.
[00:00:25] Speaker A: And with him today also is our program manager for Workforce Education, Nelson Royo. Good morning.
[00:00:30] Speaker C: Good morning, Dr. Stewart. Thank you for the opportunity.
[00:00:33] Speaker A: It's great to have you two guys with us today. We want to learn a little bit about continuing education and all the wonderful activities and things you have going around the community. So first, let's start with you, Dean Infonzone. Talk a little bit about your journey to Miami Dade College. And you have a large role over our college, but talk about how you got here and where you are today, if you will.
[00:00:52] Speaker B: I do reflect on that. Good morning. Thank you very much for having us today. I think it's a very important topic and there should be more conversations about it. So I think that this is a great start.
So it's very interesting. I think that life kind of guide me through it. I went through college here in Miami Dade, got my associate here, then went to fiu and then along the way I started doing some work for private and I was always engaged at the college, started student assistant, moved through the ranks and so on. It felt that I started student assistant here at Miami Dade College, but with continuing education. And then as I was working on private and doing some consulting, continuing, it always felt like home for me. It was home away from home. Why? Because it involves a little bit of that private practice, that private sector vibe and how reactive fast you need to be and how strategic you have to be. But on the same time, you get a great opportunity to help people every day. So kind of, you know, fell in love with the whole student purpose. I think our why, which is, you know, helping students move forward. And, and we get a lot of students that are really early stages. You know, they're not even considering college. They're not even looking in our direction whether they want to learn English or get a credential or even a summer camps. And I think it allows you the opportunity to get them at a really early stage and show them what the college does and what we're about and kind of make them grow that way. And then you see them few years later, you know, in our community doing things and, you know, it's extremely rewarding. So I fell in love with that, with that idea.
[00:02:20] Speaker A: So that's great. Nelson, tell us about your journey.
[00:02:24] Speaker C: So I worked at Miami day before and then after that I went into private I worked in advertising and marketing, and somehow along the line, I came back and I loved the idea of being here helping out people.
And the same thing that Enrique mentioned early. I like this part of Miami Dade College because we work as a private institution, sort of. We. We have a little bit more flexibility than the credit side does. And we're very engaged with the community, with local businesses.
We have partners in the community that we engage with. And I like that. You know, I like the fact that we have a little bit more independence and we can work with people, not just getting people across a career path, but all the way around it.
[00:03:18] Speaker A: Yeah, I definitely think you guys are much more entrepreneurial than we are on the credit side.
[00:03:22] Speaker B: And I may add both me and Nelson. And although this might not be very popular, but I've been at the Kendall campus since I started. I was a student here. I went here. So I have very strong ties to the Kendall campus. Well, Nelson had just a small stint at the west campus.
[00:03:39] Speaker A: Well, we're honored to have you at the Kendall campus. Let's talk a little bit about. More about continuing education and what motivates you and what are the rewarding things that you get to see? Because many of our credit folks don't really get to know all the types of students you work with. You work with students from really little ones, all the way up to people trying to learn English, all the way up to seniors. So either one of you who wants to take it talk a little bit about, you know, what motivates you in ce and then what. What are your. Some of your rewarding aspects of it?
[00:04:10] Speaker B: So I. I personally have always liked change, and I think that that's something that CE allows me to do very well.
Not one day is the same as the other. So I wake up every day and I kind of, you know, I think I flip a coin that has four faces, and I think it's rewarding. But it depends on. On the group that you're working with. Right. So when you're working with the younger population or the kids in the summer camp, it's about their parents, about seeing them, how they think, seeing how they're seeing, you know, life in general, learning them or teaching them how to learn specific skills, something in technology or writing and so on. Then you move into a different group of population, which is our GED students. And that's extremely rewarding. Most of those kids either lost their way through high school and kind of had a misstep. And it's extremely important to show them that that was just one stage of their life which will make them extremely stronger, you know, long term.
So working with those and showing them they could go to college and they, they can graduate from college and then some of them do get master's degrees and doctor's degrees and become executives at different colleges, universities, or even, you know, private banks and so on that I've met then. Then you talk to the English language learners, which, you know, it's a different population just migrated to United States and they kind of figure out their way through it. Understanding culture and how to acclimate to the countries that can contribute language is for me the most important thing that they need to learn in order to get through that entire process of adjusting.
But on the other side, you work with workforce and you work with, you know, industry leaders that are hurting for talent and art division could easily be the fastest to create a program and put up a program that reunites a set of skills for them to actually get a job and contribute to that workforce.
While on our traditional programs or our degree seeking programs, it might take you a little bit longer. So it's rewarding in all senses, you know, and then getting someone that has a job but really wants to move up in their career ladder but misses a skill or needs a credential, come to us for a short micro credential and get back to work and get a salary bump is extremely rewarding. So I think it depends on the population.
But overall, if you, if you try to tie down one thing that puts them all together, it's having the opportunity to impact someone's life every day. And I always say that to my team whenever we have, even in interviews. I wake up every day and I have the chance now have to take it to meet somebody that I could actually change their life. Whether it's conduct them in through ISO programs or talking to them about RGD programs or an industry partner that I met at a networking meeting and telling them that we could fix their talent need. I think that overall opportunities, what drives me to continue in it.
[00:06:58] Speaker C: I wanted, I wanted to mention that especially with language learners in which I have a little bit more experience with than anything else, it's very rewarding to see somebody come in, you know, they can't understand, you know, any basic form of the language. And then you see him six, seven, eight months later and they're obviously not completely fluent, but they're able to communicate, you know, they're able to follow instructions there you can tell their satisfaction from the program and, and their joy that they have when. When they speak to you in English. So that is a very satisfactory feeling to. To see somebody's progress and not only the language, but the culture aspect, you know, they understand, you know, how at this point, you know, how things are different from their culture and how Miami.
So that's a great feeling to have.
[00:07:54] Speaker A: Yeah. The reward is amazing. I know that in our continued education program, your numbers have really increased recently. Enrique, you want to talk a little bit about the growth? Because I know it's been a fast growth here in the last couple's recent.
[00:08:07] Speaker B: So it's all the team. I mean, I have to say I have the greatest team of the college.
They're very creatively in the way they think. They're very passionate. They really believe that continuing education could change lives, which is our why the growth has been in multiple areas. So technology is being a sore for us. Obviously, what the college is doing with the technology movements really helped us.
As the college becomes a technology leader in workforce development, it has allowed us the opportunity to collaborate with our School of Engineering Technology to actually build programs that create that seamless transition from continuing education programs into our traditional programs.
But also on the English language learning side, we have three programs all soaring. You're looking at about maybe 16, 17,000 students a year attending those programs. And a lot of those students end up going into our continuing education side because it allows them the opportunity to go into college longer term or find a job in the workforce that eventually routes them back into continuing education. So when you're looking at our English language programs, ESL on the adult education side, or our intensive English programs have different perspective or teaches different populations language that, you know, moves them forward.
I think that is extremely important to.
[00:09:35] Speaker C: To.
[00:09:35] Speaker B: To also understand that what the college is doing and what the campuses are doing, it's helping continuing that with their mission as well.
The. The more movement or the more initiatives and strategy that we have in our college credit programs, for lack of better words, it helps continuing at one finds find a way where we could help but also create movement and sound around what is happening at the college has helped continue in it and different from what we had been doing in the past, we're extremely active on anything the college does and we're always at the table. We're being given a seat at the table to discuss initiatives, strategy, funding and all the other things. I think that keeping continuing it there has allowed one, the college to react pretty fast to a lot of the needs, but two, a lot better collaboration between continuing education and all Departments, which has helped our success in terms of enrollment.
[00:10:34] Speaker A: That's really great. I know you mentioned working with other campuses. What do you see as some of the big initiatives coming forward in the coming years?
What are some of the things you'd like to tell our audience that, hey, this is a partnership that we're doing. I know you've done a lot with AI and various things, but if you look in your crystal ball, what do you see is next for you guys?
[00:10:55] Speaker B: So there is a strategy and a plan and then there's things that jump in the middle of that plan. Right. So I do think that as colleges, there was a time when we lost track of trades and those very important blue collar jobs that are now hurting for talent. And I think you're going to see a significant growth on the trades. We have launched our commercial driver license program. We're launching a construction trades institute in terms of the actual space, because the construction classes are already running in terms of electricians, plumbers, developing talent for carpentry and welding and so on. But also on that renewable energy size or something like photovoltaic solar paneling, you know, you know, concrete and other areas of sustainability, you know, how to pour concrete in a very sustainable way, which is, you know, kind of a very interesting topic. But also semiconductors, you know, on the trade side, aviation and so on. We're building a part 147 school which is an aviation maintenance technician program. It's going to hopefully be available later on, I would say around July or August of this year to go full in action. And that is going to train folks on skills that are needed on the aviation industry, but also in aerospace, which is a growing sector in conversations and other things in Miami Dade County, I think it's extremely important to build those traits because not every student has meant to go to college and get a master's degree or a bachelor's degree. A lot of students would like to get a job because they need to make money. And then with that same job, on those credentials, they'll pay themselves through college and then they'll get their bachelor's degree or their master's degree.
[00:12:44] Speaker A: So it's very impressive. You mentioned about 12 or 15 different jobs with trades in aviation and aerospace, and that's really important. Nelson, talk a little bit about collaborating with local businesses and organizations.
How do you align their needs with the programs you offer? And talk about a little bit about that, if you would.
[00:13:02] Speaker C: So, so something that a lot of folks may not know. Continuing education, does a lot of corporate training in addition to the students that we serve on campus, we also go out in the community and do specific trainings or customized trainings, depending on the company needs.
Currently we have about six or seven trainings out of Kendall.
We have an instructor visit the job site and we have about five classes and five English classes right now with different companies within the area.
We also are doing leadership training with a couple other partners.
So I think is an important side of continuing education that we're able to serve companies in the area with specific needs.
And this is an opportunity for employees, you know, that the companies are able to finance some of this education that employees get and we're there to serve. You know, we customize the training.
We do specifics on what they want, whether it's language learning or other subjects.
[00:14:20] Speaker B: That traditionally has been the case, though, for as long as we have been open. We've always addressed some of those corporate trainings and some of those is when those conversations about workforce needs and talent needs are and those we have conversations about how do we develop those programs faster, how they're customized. Our president always talks about the Uber of education.
How do we create that?
You know, it's still not one on one, but very highly customized training for what the employer needs.
And it's part of what we have been doing to try to become that sandbox for innovation for the college in the way that we address needs, whether it's long term workforce development needs or is a quick training on customer service or, you know, sales and things of that nature.
[00:15:07] Speaker A: Yeah, I think the customized word is something that I think of with you guys that you very do very well.
What are the programs that are most popular that you offer?
[00:15:14] Speaker B: You know, that always is a trick question because the moment that I'm not trying to trick you today, the moment that I said, what program is the one that has the most enrollment? The next day another program boosts on enrollment. And I hope that's the case. But we have to think, if I were to think in terms of where enrollment comes from, English classes are number one, no doubt, regardless of the program, whether it's through our revisit or through our ESL program in Adult Edition or Intensive English. That is a really large crowd that comes to a college and has given us the opportunity to teach them English. Our childcare program is extremely well attended. We have a childcare program that teaches folks to get credentials to either become a childcare director and acquire state licenses or industry certifications that allow them to practice in the childcare space.
We're Also the testing provider for South Florida, Miami Dade College as a whole is the testing provider for Department of Children and Families. Families for people to acquire those credentials, regardless of where they get the training.
I would say our tech programs are very well attended. And if you're looking at specific classes, so something like RBT is actually very popular right now. Our CNA program is still doing great and strong at different campuses.
I think trades in general are growing and are supposed to grow. We're building a new broadband space that the north campus, which will launch I think at the end of the week. And, and it's, it's the trades are allowing that same group of students that are relocating into the county to actually get a quick credential, to get a really good job long term. Right. And all of our programs that we have developed have a transition from continuing education into our degree seeking classes, whether it's in NTECH or in business and so on.
[00:17:04] Speaker C: Dr. Sue. And if you're talking about the summer, we have summer camps.
[00:17:08] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:17:09] Speaker C: And anytime during the summer, you know, June, July.
[00:17:12] Speaker A: Talk about summer. Yeah, go.
[00:17:14] Speaker C: You have 250 kids running around the campus.
I mean, I don't mean it in a crazy way, but we do. It's a very popular program we have.
[00:17:24] Speaker A: It's a big service you perform this summer. Yeah, talk a little bit about that.
[00:17:27] Speaker C: So we have two major programs during the summer. One is called Wild Things Happen, which is a traditional camp in which no wild things happen.
[00:17:36] Speaker B: No wild things happen on that camp.
It's just the name, name.
[00:17:43] Speaker C: Probably right now it would, that would have gone through if we, if we were to name it at this point.
But, but it, but it, it is a long standing program that we offer here. And, and, and so that is a traditional camp. Kids come in. We have ages from 5 to 11. Enrique 5, 5 to 11.
[00:18:02] Speaker B: 5 to 11 year olds, 5 to 11.
[00:18:03] Speaker C: And they're separated into different groups and they do all kinds of great activities during the summer. In addition to that, we have a kids and teens college which is for older folks and they come in and take classes during the summer. They do an afternoon session, a morning session and afternoon session and they're divided into age groups as well. And they take computer classes, they take drawing, cooking, some of, you know, it's a great opportunity to expose them to different fields at a, at a young age. So, so summer is, it's a big part of our program here.
[00:18:42] Speaker B: It differentiates the two programs. One is on all traditional summer camp activities, they are kept into groups, their age throughout the entire day, they go to the pool, they play sports, they do some reading. We always try to put some academic component in there. The Kidston College, which I'm very attached to, it was. I was involved with Kidston College, and when I started with the college is.
Is a very baby.
[00:19:05] Speaker C: That's your baby.
[00:19:05] Speaker B: It is. In a way, it is.
It's a super interesting program because it was built to allow kids to have an opportunity to have a college experience before they get the age of college. So it's a program in which you have different activities per age group. So you have the 7 through 17, so you have your early ons, middle group, which is 10 through 12, and then your teenagers. And the idea is that we create classes. Robotics, logistics, architecture, furniture design, you know, 3D design and so on, that they could pick every week what they do in the morning and they do in the afternoon. So in a way, kind of imitates what a college schedule is like. Semester by semester, you get to pick your activities. And parents love it because they could do a robotics class in the morning where the kids get very exciting, and then in the afternoon, they'll put them in a reading class or math class or science, and then they're advanced, they're academics. At the same time, they're touching on other skills that they would like to touch on. And the good thing about that program is that on the teenager size, those 13 through 17, they get exposed to classes that already are, hinting, whether it's coding or design or swift, that it's already touching on what college, a college career could look like. You know, some of them want to get their CPR certification or going through their lifeguard training.
I think the program itself, kind of. That's why we call it Kidston College, is that opportunity for parents and kids to get that taste of what they like and what they don't. Obviously, we have the arts, anything from dance to salsa, meringue, hip hop, and so on. Also have music classes, you know, art, painting, portrait, and so on. So it's very diverse. It goes all the way from STEM steam into sports and so on. So it's a. It's a super diverse program that allows the kids to pick what they like, but also allows the parents to. To have some tricks in there for the academics.
[00:20:54] Speaker A: Yeah, you took me on a tour of that last summer, and I was really impressed with a lot of the technology they're doing. And the chef. That's right. Got to eat a little. I appreciate that. But no, it's a Very impressive program. And for those in our audience, I would strongly recommend you look into that for your children. I want to go back. Dean Infonsona, something you said about transitioning your students to credit. I know there's a lot of intentionality with that. Could you talk a little bit about, as you mentioned, not everyone wants to go to the credit side, but you do get a good number of your folks that come to you and want to transition into the credit. Can you talk about how that process works?
[00:21:27] Speaker B: I think it's been the focus since I started in this journey. But, um, I think we have to do a lot more in that sense. So on one side, I think the intentionality of how we build programs has changed. So in the past, we will build programs based on what we thought could sell for continuing it. And what's changed is we're developing programs focused on what workforce needs. So in other words, just very much like our workforce program or our division for workforce program, it starts with what is the need in the, in the industry?
Um, we assess how many jobs are there, how much is it paying, what's the average pay rate or the skills needed and so on. A lot of the times it does, does come from someone in the industry says, I'm hurting, I need this many people.
One of those examples is in aviation. We had an industry partner that came in and said, I need 200 technicians, you know, within, you know, 16 months, and it will take us seven months to train them. So we need to get into a program right now. At that point, the design is no different than what we would do for our workforce programs. We actually designed the program in a way where we, when they finish our continuing ed program, they immediately acquire credit through our PLA department and our internal tmobs to actually just continue their education on our certificate or credit programs. The focus is from the building aspect. We have spent the last three, four years building bridges from non credit to credit on every single one of our programs to have a workforce component. The second part of that is how do you then expose students to what the college does? And in our English language programs or GED is very synergetic because they're here all day every day for two, three hours every day. So there's a lot of points of intersection where we either expose them for college activity or they talk to an advisor or pre college advisors talk to our teams, our deans of schools connect with my team to do presentations on the programs and so on. So that's, that's that part because they need to be aware of what the college has in terms of scholarships. And we have so much that we could offer this population. But our team's also being very creative in how do we expose them to college activities. Now what do we need to do is now the bridges are built and continue to do the effort. On the other side, we have made the connections with our credit programs and our advisement offices. How do we scale it up so is a consistent process and for those students to understand that the option is there. I mean not every student is going to take that that door, but at least they know the door is open if they want to knock on it. So I think that is the biggest work that we've done is build programs for workforce in the same way that we would build it for credit. And from the moment we're building these programs, we already think that that's going to be an on ramp into any other program that we do. Whether it's fiber optics, we or an electrician or we do it on cdl. All of those programs move into transportation. They'll move into our electrical engineering program or if it's a swift program and moving to iOS developers. So it's already built that way from the get go. So the student has a very seamless transition from one to the other.
[00:24:37] Speaker A: Thank you for that answer. That's a great answer.
[00:24:39] Speaker C: I wanted to add a little bit. So some of the non credit classes that we offer, whether it's English or other ones during the day, we encourage students and the instructors do as well.
If there's an activity on campus, they're taken there. So they know what college life is. They know what once they are into a system that provides classes and all that, they understand that there's activities on campus, that this is something fun where they can learn.
And, and that is one of the ways in which we try to, I mean in a propagandistic way, you know, we encourage that as well.
[00:25:22] Speaker A: For those students that maybe can't attend campus. Do we have online or hybrid options for them?
[00:25:28] Speaker B: We do. So most of our programs, not to say all they do have. So we use the same teaching modality that the college uses in terms of, you know, in person. And we have our MDC live, which is live online, you know, in a 2D type of environment.
And then we do have what we call hybrids, which is some of the meeting person, some of them really meet online.
Our CE on demand is very much like our MDC online. So it's do on your own. The only thing that we've changed on that. Is that anything that is on demand, it has the ability for you to have at some points and some touch base with an expert or a faculty so that you could go through the content on your own, but at the end you actually could clarify some questions or ask some questions. So it's in every modality you could think of. So you could do it on your own, you can come in person, you could do it online Life or there's a hybrid version which our version of hybrid. It's technically live, but sometimes they meet in person, sometimes they meet on MDC live. So let's say you have a classes four days a week. We don't want to make you drive four times a week to the campus, you know, and deal with traffic. What we do is twice a week we might have an in person twice a week we might do it live. And at that point it allows the students for, you know, the time commitment is usually a big thing for. Cuz I'll you know, say most of our students are working.
So it's extremely useful for them because they now plan to be here Monday and Wednesday, but Thursday, Friday or Tuesday, Thursday they are doing the program completely live. So any modality.
[00:27:04] Speaker A: Thank you for that Dr. Sewer.
[00:27:06] Speaker C: I wanted to mention that right now we are offering a PMP program online. What is, what is Program Management Professional?
We are also doing COMPTIA online. So these are certifications that people can do pretty much from their house and then come in and take the exam. So there's no need for people to come on campus and learn Dispute.
[00:27:31] Speaker A: I think it goes back to the word both of you said is customization. You customize the program based on what the business or industry needs.
[00:27:38] Speaker B: Yeah, I think people, whether before or after the pandemic, I think the pandemic was a big catalyst in the process, but people were already changing their consumption, consumption paths.
The Amazon and the Ubers, people want to consume in the way they want to consume. So as long as we have it available, some of them call and say, well, you know, I need to be there in person. Well, we have that option for you. Some of them say, well, you know, the time commitment to drive, I don't want it. I could take it from home, but I need someone live. Well, we have that option for you. But if you come and say, you know what? I learned most of my own, I'm going to do it whenever I'm available. I have a busy life. I just want to grab that capsule of knowledge on my own terms. You get on CE on demand. And you learn on your own in a will and you can connect to somebody that could clarify questions and so on. So I think that's the key. It's how do you meet them based on their consumption patterns and how they want to consume knowledge and information.
[00:28:34] Speaker A: You know, we've talked a little bit about the different programs and kind of the articulation to credit. What kind of support do you give for students that are at the end of your. Of the process that need job placement help or internships or, or career advancement? I'm sure talk about what you do with those kind of individuals at that stage.
[00:28:53] Speaker B: So we use the, the, the, the college infrastructure for pretty much everything we do. I mean everything that we are trying to do, the college has been doing for many, many years. So when students finish a program, the options are any program and continuing it. The options are very simple. You either go work or get a better job or go into the industry or you continue your education. In any of our programs, which they have plenty of options and in all of those options, there's scholarship or there's financial aid and there's options for them to continue.
So obviously we work very closely with MDC works. You know, we work career sources out Florida to help us one, prepare resumes, interviews and so on. On the MDC works side, we also have a lot of industry partners that have lined up to hire people, whether through CNA or our aviation students already have or are in demand. But we do the same on pretty much any workforce program that we're building. We're building it with the partners at the table where we understand the amount of talent that they need or a number of positions they have open. I think that is one way. But we also leverage the existing college structure to channel those students to the right partners or through the right departments that could allow them to either find jobs or even get a better resume or better skills that are interviewing and so on. So I think that's key. It's to leverage what we already have rather than being reinventing the wheel.
[00:30:14] Speaker A: Kind of went to my next question, but I'm going to still ask it anyway just to make sure we hit everything. You talked about partnerships but talk about how they establish real world opportunities. You just mentioned a few, but I think that's important for our audience to know that these aren't just babysitter opportunities. You have partnerships with individuals who are, who these people end up in real world, real jobs.
[00:30:36] Speaker B: So some of these examples, you know, if you're looking at where, where Education or, or war force education is going to have to address some needs. Right. So there are some of those existing positions we've already seen. So electric vehicles is one electrical vehicle charging. It's going to be something that at some point there's a big talent need there.
You're looking at solar or the trades and so on. What we do is we build the programs with the industry partner and I'll give some examples. You know, when we, we work very closely, work career and technical education.
Dr. Alexia Roald, who manages our or oversees our apprenticeship programs. We, we, there was a need for automotive technicians, you know, your old time mechanics and you know, we partner with being automotive and launched our first automotive technician there. And the idea is that the students come take some classroom instruction with us right out of the dealership and then they do on the job training. Right on it. If you're looking at examples that are, you know, in our broadband program, we one met with our industry partner, you know, on Friday, I think we'll be signing the ceremony so I will not spoil it for anybody, but we met with the industry partner, we looked at their career ladders and what was their need. And then we, we built a curriculum first in Florida, both credit and on the continuing ed side. And if you notice, I don't say non credit because we're getting away from that on both sides. Continuing ed and credit that actually address specifically the need but also the career ladder plans for them long term so they could grow in the company. But we want to step beyond that. So when we were designing our actual lab where practices are going to happen, we actually asked the industry partner to come in and build it for us the same way that they will build a lab to teach people in industry. So if you head out to the north and, and at the end of the week you'll see what it looks like. Exactly.
You know, what a pull farm will look like for those that are installing, you know, fiber optics.
It's, it's having the partners at the table helping us design the program. And you remember our CNA labs in every single room. It did.
It represents exactly what a hospital room would look like. And the equipment in there is identical, even sometimes the same equipment that hospitals will use. Because the idea is that they leave Miami Dade College whether on the continuing ed side or not. And they hit immediately. They understand the equipment, they've seen it before. So it's no different than what we've been doing at the college for many years. But I think continuing at our changes when we're building the content for the programs. We're building it with the partner for the partner. And aviation is exactly the same. We have an industry partner seating that's trying to hire, like I said, 200 positions. We have another industry partner who has been in aviation for many years, which is our friends at bits, Baron 10 Irving and his team. And in that area, we actually are putting the lab right at Opa Loca airport where the students are going to be training right at Opa Loca, seeing airplanes every day and working through it. So I think that's essential when we're building spaces because the students now would understand what that industry is, what's the environment, what the drive is to one of these airports every single day. So I think that's key when we're building programs, which is slightly different from what we used to do in the past and continuing it.
[00:34:04] Speaker A: Thank you for that. Let's. Let me end with one last question to both of you, and I'll start with you, Nelson. Tell us a success story. I know you probably have a lot of students that are floating in your head that you've worked with, but. But give us an example of one success story, if you will.
[00:34:16] Speaker C: So one that comes to mind. I mean, there are a number of them, and we do have students, like we had mentioned before, that come in and they're very shy about even taking the exam. And then you see them six, seven months later, maybe a year later, and they're fluent. So we had someone who participated into our program that ended up going to law school.
This person.
[00:34:46] Speaker A: That's great.
[00:34:46] Speaker C: Yeah, this person came to Miami Dade, did various levels of English, ended up going to FIU, and they got accepted into St. Thomas University and completed his law degree.
[00:35:02] Speaker A: That's a great advertisement, too, because to develop those skills to be a lawyer.
[00:35:06] Speaker C: Correct.
Kudos to your team, especially. Especially language skills.
[00:35:10] Speaker A: Language. Right.
[00:35:11] Speaker C: You need a little language to. To get into law school. So. So that's somebody that has kept in touch, you know, over the years. And I think it's a. It's a great example of what we do here.
[00:35:21] Speaker A: That's great. Dean Panzon, you got an example of a.
[00:35:25] Speaker B: Yes, I'll share two examples, and I have to share two because one of them is very personal. I'll share that one last. But we had a student that had just recently relocated from Cuba here, you know, and Leandro, at the time that he came in, you know, he was trying to figure it out, what to do next. As a young guy, he came through our English program He got, you know, he learned English with us. Then from there his teacher connected with the college and you know, he ended up going to the honors college, graduated from the honors college and got a full ride to go to Cornell. So we've done some follow ups with him. He got a full ride to Cornell and then, you know, he did his bachelor's at Cornell, got a scholarship to do his master's, finished master's, establish his own company. His goals always was, you know, I want to own my own medical device company and I want to be the main engineer in the development of, research and development of this. So, you know, Leander still in touch with, with his, his faculty at the time and it's extremely rewarding because again, like I said, they, they come and they don't even know the language. And seeing them graduated from a master's degree. The other story, and we have, we have hundreds of this that we're actually documenting. There's videos on our YouTube channels and so on, on this. But there is, there's a young guy that came in, I won't, I won't say the name because, you know, rather keep it private. But he came in and he was at that process where he was being diagnosed with, with autism. You know, ended up that he was diagnosed with autism. He came to our summer camp and he was about 7 or so. So parents came in, super involved parents. They come in and asked at the time I was with the summer camp and said, you know, I would like to know, you know, what, what is there for my son? He has motor skills problem. You know, he's showing X, Y and Z. We still don't know, but we're going to figure out. So we sat down with a group of teachers, obviously that knew how to work with diverse students. And we come up with a plan for him to take summer camp classes in kids and teens college here at the Kendall campus. So things like keyboarding or LEGO animation, LEGO robotics. We gave him some clay creations and some art classes. Well, by the end of the summer camp. Summer camp's only nine weeks. He was here for about probably eight, nine weeks. By the end of the summer camp, he could eat on his own, he could write with a pencil, things that he couldn't do before he could type on a computer.
He went on to high school. I know he was diagnosed eventually with autism, but he's doing great in school. I think the last time we touched base was maybe three, four years ago with the dad. But there was a lot of stories within that experience. But seeing Someone that came in super young. The parents trusting the college in the opportunity for us to help them in that journey and seeing how not only he adjusted, but he excelled at the summer camp and seeing how much fun he had in the process, extremely rewarding for me personally. But certainly, you know, kids, when parents drop our kids, and I say this all the time in our summer camps, is a big leap of faith. They're trusting the college with their most precious and valuable, you know, human in their lives. So we take it very, very serious. And being. Or having the opportunity to have these young lives and, you know, helping them in whatever way we can, I think it's an honor and it is an opportunity that we shouldn't take for granted. So that one's probably one of the most rewarding because I personally worked with him for seven or eight weeks.
[00:38:54] Speaker A: Thank you both for those great stories, success stories. We appreciate those. We always like to end our broadcast by turning the microphone around and letting you guys ask me a question. So if you'd like, you don't have to, but is there anything you like to ask me?
[00:39:05] Speaker B: So do I go easier or do we have the hard questions here?
[00:39:08] Speaker A: What do you say? I've had hard ones. I've had students ask some pretty rough ones. So whatever you feel like on Monday.
[00:39:13] Speaker B: So I think it's, you know, continuing education. And you and I have worked together, you know, very closely on developing programs and doing a lot of these things. But what do you think that we are. Continuing education could do better, can help the campus, advance the campus strategy. I always say that we could meet our numbers and still fulfill our goals by doing it ourselves without collaboration.
But the reality is that there's. There's nothing in it for us. For us working with the campuses and advancing your goals, we're still advancing ours. It makes it that much better, I think, for your team to understand who we worked. And Kendall is one of those campus I work very closely with. But how can we in continuing education help you advance the, you know, the strategy at the campus?
[00:40:03] Speaker A: Well, first of all, throughout my career, I've always felt that continued education and credit were linked. And I've always looked at them as partners. And I think that's the first thing we need to do, is to make sure that it's a partnership. Like you were talking early about all the businesses you work with. We need to look at it as a partnership between non credit, which we don't continue education and credit.
But I also think we need to knock down those silos.
I think there's things people think in the past that don't no longer exist. A student is a student is a student. We're here to serve Miami Dade county and all our students. And so I think there's a lot of technology issues that you're really great at, helping us percolate programs quicker than we can in credit. I think that's one of the number one things. But I also want to make sure that we're not losing students who matriculate to you and then they slip through our hands and we don't, we don't get them to the finish line on the credit side. And you both have made great points, that not every student needs an associate's degree, that they need a credential. They need whatever they need to go to work.
And I would say, Enrique, that would be the thing I would love for us to be better at is regardless of whatever student walks through that door, we're going to help them. They may start with you, they may come to us, they may be back with you. Who knows?
I don't want to see a student that we didn't help hold their hand and get where they need to be.
[00:41:26] Speaker B: That's very enlightening. I think that that is part of our job now.
It's how do we continue to blur those lines between credit and non credit, not only on the program design, but also on the recruitment and the efforts internally. And I'll have one more that I.
[00:41:40] Speaker C: Just wanted to ask him. So. So you've been here for almost a year, right?
[00:41:44] Speaker A: Almost seven years?
[00:41:46] Speaker C: No, no, no, I'm saying I can.
[00:41:47] Speaker A: Yeah, I came in June. June will be my birthday here.
[00:41:50] Speaker C: What, what, what, what has been your.
I mean, what, what has caused different things about camp, about Kendall? Like what were, what was expected, what was, what's a surprise?
What's your overall feeling of the campus, of the people at Kendall, of the students at Kendall, the employees at Kendall?
[00:42:10] Speaker B: Let's be careful. Medical might be listening.
[00:42:12] Speaker A: They might be. Well, medical. I still look at things through a medical eye at times and I still get questions about medical and I always have that in my DNA.
But one of the things I was most excited about coming here was working with honors students, with students that weren't as motivated as those medical. Because, you know, medical. Everybody wants, they want to be a nurse so they know what they want to be. But I love our honors students, our college ready students, all these students who come to us and really don't know what the future holds. And I love the ability to talk to them and, you know, hear their goals. And, you know, my DNA as a math teacher is more academic, which this campus has. And so it's just the people here, the faculty are incredible. The staff, they're very welcoming. But I think the students would be the thing that I've enjoyed the most about the Kendall campus. Athletics has been a lot of fun to participate in, but we have great students here and great students who are taught by great faculty and staff. And so that's what's been the best part for my role here in this short time.
[00:43:11] Speaker B: So I'll ask the last one. I know we'll cut it short, but if I were a student here, and then I always ask that question because Kendall probably it's one of two that has this college, like, university campus environment that really, you know, every campus at Miami is so unique and different. The experiences are different. If you only go to one, thank God our students go around it. But as a student here who graduated here, I could remember why I came to Kendall. What I love Kendall. So if I were a student here and I'll graduate from here in two years, what is the one piece that you would like me to remember Kendall by?
[00:43:49] Speaker A: Well, I'll tell you what I've heard for the last however many months, eight months, ten months I've been here is I've been in the community and talked to people. There's so many people just like you, Enrique, that came from Kendall, that went to Kendall campus. And when they hear that I'm at the Kendall campus, they rush up to me and say, hey, I went to Kendall. I went to South Campus. And I love when we had the baseball Alumni association two weekends ago. And those guys, you know, some of those guys couldn't run to first base, but they love this campus. Their heart is. Is still in what this campus did for him. And that's what I would say to your. Your question is that, you know, hopefully those students that graduate us will come back, will tell us what they're doing, that we help change their lives or help. Helped improve their lives in some aspects.
[00:44:29] Speaker B: Very cool. Very cool.
[00:44:30] Speaker A: Well, thank you, gentlemen, Dean Funzone program manager Arroyo. Thank you both for being here. This has been a great conversation. Really enjoyed learning more about continuing education and you two individuals and look forward to future partnerships with you.
[00:44:44] Speaker C: Thank you for the opportunity.
[00:44:45] Speaker A: I want to also thank Christine Signs, our head writer, Paul Klein, our executive producer, who's sitting in the producer chair today, and thank you all for listening. And that's all for today. Goodbye for now.
